That is interesting. Thanks.
When you say "Paul's 7 post-Acts books"
do you mean in the order they appear in the NT or the dates of writing?
You must mean writing dates, because ALL of Paul's books appear after Acts.
What's the list then? My writing dates might not agree with yours. Thanks.
Eph, Phil, Col, 1&2Tim, Titus, and Philemon. Eph, Phil, Col, 2Tim, and maybe Philemon are often called the prison epistles, since their internal evidence shows they were written by Paul as a prisoner in Rome.
When I first learned this 30 years ago, a most important 1st verse was Philippians 1:10 . Where is says, "approve thing that are excellent", Strong's says, "try (or, test) the things that differ." Don't ask me why. Using the latter translation, one can probably find at least 50 solid differences between Paul's post-Acts epistles and Acts plus Paul's Acts epistles. I won't get into this now, but the dividing line is Acts of the Apostles 28:25-28 . Here's the two main differences. By Before, I mean during Acts and by After, I mean Paul's 7 post-Acts epistles. By the other 59 books, I mean all Bible books except for Paul's 7 post-Acts books.
In prophecy?
Before - Acts of the Apostles 26:22 . Everything Paul taught, both to Jews and Gentiles, was based on prophecy. There is a mystery in Romans 16:25-26 . In vs 26, we find this mystery was hidden in the scripture of the prophets.
After - Ephesians 3:3 , Ephesians 3:9 , Colossians 1:26-27 , Everything taught was contained in a Mystery (secret) and was hid in God from every age and generation. Nothing about this can be found in any of the other 59 books.
Calling?
Before - Galatians 4:26 , Hebrews 12 , The New Jerusalem, which isn't Heaven. It comes down out of Heaven and attaches to the New Earth. It is Heavenly in nature, but not in location. Similar to the Kingdom of Heaven, which will be on earth, but will be ruled by Heaven. There is no mention in any of the 59 books that anyone ever had a hope of going to heaven.
After - Compare Ephesians 1:20 (where Christ is now) with Ephesians 2:6 (where we'll be- exact same place). The Greek translated as Heavenly Places occurs only in Ephesians. See Philippians 3:20 , Our citizenship is in Heaven.
Brief notes on a couple of others
Chosen When?
Before - 2 Thessalonians 2:13 , From (
since) the beginning
After - Ephesians 1:4 ,
Before the foundation of the world. I know this sounds crazy, but sometimes, when I'm reading Ephesians, I feel that I was actually there, in Heavenly Places, before the world began. My Son says he feels the same thing. He's been into this longer than I have. It took him about 5 minutes, 30 years ago, to convince me that this was the only way to fly. Then, it took 10 years to totally erase all the Acts baggage that was polluting my mind
Hope?
Before - the Rapture
After - Colossians 3:1-4 , the Appearing. Note that Glory in vs 4 is located above the heavens in Psalms 8:1 , at least in the KJV
Then, after testing the things that differ in Philippians 1:10 , you obey 2 Timothy 2:15 and rightly divide (Strong's: make a straight cut, correctly cut, correctly dissect) God's Word of Truth.
Strong's #3718: orthotomeo (pronounced or-thot-om-eh'-o)
from a compound of 3717 and the base of 5114, to make a straight cut, i.e. (figuratively) to dissect (expound) correctly (the divine message):--rightly divide.
Many modern Bibles use weak milky words, in this verse, like "rightly handling" or "handling aright", as used on the horrible ASV on this forum. From what I've learned, the idea of cutting God's word must be there. I believe that only one cut is required and its purpose is to separate every thing given only to Israel from everything given only to the Gentiles. Otherwise, there will be confusion and people will have to pick and choose between the Jewish and Gentile alternatives, and that's unacceptable. There's only one place this cut is possible - at the very end of Acts. That way, Paul's 7 post-Acts, all-Gentile books, are on one side of the cut and the other 59 all-Israel books are all on the other side. You then utilize only the post-Acts books for determining what God's plan is for you and your fellow Gentiles. You are not losing those other 59 books. You need them to learn a myriad of things. You just have to avoid them for things that personally will affect you and your family. As a bonus, if you cut the scripture rightly, you will be approved unto God and will have no reason to feel ashamed, as per 2 Timothy 2:15 , There is one huge
universal exception to all of this - Christ's sacrifice on the cross and our subsequent salvation because of it. You can't divide it.
There's a jillion other things but that's enough for now. I presently have collected over 10,000 audios, averaging about 45 minutes each, and over 3000 books and articles by people who feel exactly the same way I do about these things. I didn't just make all this stuff up. It really truly works and I am positive it is the pinnacle of all methods of interpretation. There is probably not one mainstream denominational preacher in the world that
Rightly Divides God's Word. This is the biggest reason Christianity is in such a horrible mess.
Both Philippians 1:10 and 2 Timothy 2:15 appear only in Paul's post-Acts epistles. This is not a coincidence. They were never needed before because everything written before was all-Israel. Only when Israel was set aside, as a nation, due to Paul's pronouncement of blindness, using Isaiah 6:9-10 for the 7th and last time in scripture, in Acts 28:25-27 , and a brand new, totally different, Gentile church was started, is right division needed. Gotta separate what is yours from what isn't yours, scripturally, if you are a genuine truthseeker..
